Murder in the Rue de Paradis

by Cara Black

  “An Anatolian Sufi gave me this amulet at a Kurdish Dervish ceremony.”

  In the slant of moonlight, she stared at the gleaming worn Ottoman coin.

  “A talisman for vision, to help you to see your way. It prevents you from being blinded by obstacles and false paths. Betrothed girls wear this before the wedding ceremony. And a ring like this.”

  He held out a beaten copper Turkish puzzle ring.

  “Will you accept this?”

  Dumbfounded, she stared at him.

  “Close your mouth, Aimée,” he said. “You can nod yes or no.”

  She stared at him. “You’re serious?”

  “That’s not an answer,” he said. His eyes crinkled in sadness. “Or maybe it is.”

  “For real, Yves?”

  He nodded.

  Something shifted inside her. A warm feeling welled up . . . happiness, security, or the knowledge that he was the one . . . the words didn’t matter. Now it was all so simple. Her doubts were gone in a flutter of air. She wanted him. Had wanted him for a long time.

  “And we can make some babies,” he said. He reached for her cheek and her hands caught his.

  “That takes work.”

  “So you’ll have me?” A slow smile spread on his lips as she guided the ring onto her ring finger.

  She edged her leg around his waist, gripped his neck, eased him flat on the floor, straddling his hips.

  “‘Have you,’ Yves? Yes, yes, yes.”

  He pulled her down on top of him, and smothered her words with kisses.

  AIMÉE BLINKED AT the pink-apricot rays filtering through the half circle of the loft window. The clock read 10 A.M. Late! She reached out and felt an empty space beside her.

  “Yves?”

  No answer. No welcoming aroma of coffee. She stood and pulled a sheet around her. She looked in the bathroom and spotless kitchen. No note. No Yves.

  She didn’t see his briefcase, and wondered for a moment if she’d dreamed last night. But his musky scent still clung to her.

  He’d asked her to marry him. The beaten copper ring encircled her finger. Why shouldn’t she trust him? She knew he was undercover. But old doubts invaded her. He’d left without even waking her to say good-bye. She was ready to kick herself for her stupidity. Again. She slipped into her clothes and shouldered her laptop case.

  Blinking back angry tears, she walked through the narrow courtyard lined with bamboo trees in planters of the former printing works. Wind chimes tinkled and sun glinted on the tall, wood-framed loft windows. At the door, she knotted her scarf around her shoulders. Outside, by the canal, whose waters shimmered in the sun, she caught the stares of truck drivers driving past. Luck was on her side; she caught a taxi.

  OUTSIDE HER OFFICE she nodded to Maurice, the one-armed Algerian-veteran news vendor whose kiosk was near the café. With an adroit maneuver of his stump, Maurice stacked yesterday’s Le Monde, the same edition she’d noticed lying on Yves’s briefcase last night.

  “Business good, Maurice?” she asked.

  “These headlines increase sales,” he said. “Sad to say.”

  The article in the paper on the Metro bombing cited a police source indicating that new leads to suspects ranged from Bosnian Serbs angry at the French accords, members of Hamas angry at Arafat’s projected visit, the iKK Kurdish party that had demonstrated last week at the Turkish Embassy and to militant GIA Algerians suspected of murdering a moderate imam two weeks earlier.

  In short, the police had nothing to go on, and so had fallen back on the usual suspects.

  “The Metro’s running on a limited schedule,” he said. “You know how that goes.”

  With half the city taking part in the annual vacation exodus, the museums closed, bus schedules reduced to the minimum, and heightened security, the streets lay quiet. She slipped Maurice two francs, took a paper, and headed to her office.

  The sun filled the air; another hot August day. A few cotton puff clouds hovered over the Louvre’s Cour Carrée façade. For a moment the image of Yves, the stubble on his chin and the feel of his warm legs enfolding hers, filled her. But when she fingered the Turkish puzzle ring she was tempted to toss it into the sewer drain.

  When he called she’d demand an explanation. She pushed Yves out of her mind.

  In the cool foyer of her office building she sighed. There was an “out of order” sign posted on the elevator. Great! That meant no repair until September.

  Inside Leduc Detective, she set her laptop on the desk, headed for the armoire, changed into a top and black pencil skirt, then switched on the espresso machine. In five minutes thick brown-black liquid with a decent tan foam dripped into the demitasse cup. She stirred in brown sugar cubes, sipped, and welcomed the jolt of caffeine.

  The office door unlocked and she turned, cup in hand, to see the flushed face of her partner, René Friant. A dwarf, he wore an off-white double-breasted linen suit tailored to his four-foot-tall frame. And matching tasseled loafers.

  “The elevator repairman on his way, Aimée?”

  The concierge was no doubt sitting on a shale beach in Brittany with his family as they spoke.

  She shook her head.

  He took out a handkerchief, wiped his wide brow and set a printout on her desk. “It’s only one of many things that don’t work here. The heating’s more temperamental than my Italian printer, working full blast now instead of in December.” René gestured around the high-ceilinged wood-paneled office which was filled by a period recamier, marble fireplace, directoire desks, and computer ware. “And we’ve outgrown this place.”

  True. But her grandfather had founded Leduc Detective at the very desk she now used.

  “Check this out, Aimée,” he said. “It’s for sale.”

  On the printout she saw price comparisons of building footage. “A factory floor in Passage du Desir, René? You’re kidding, right?”

  “The mortgage payments will be less than our rent,” he said. “And we’d own it. Instead of scrambling every month to pay off our landlord’s mortgage.”

  What had gotten into him?

  “And if we didn’t make it, René,” she said, “there’d be no extension from the landlord, and we’d be out on the cobblestones.”

  “Look at the figures, Aimée. Our payments would go for space we’d own,” he said, a child-like excitement in his eyes. “We’d build equity, instead of throwing money at a landlord every month and having nothing to show for it. It makes financial sense.” He pointed to the peeling wainscoting and the dim, wavering chandelier suspended from the high ceiling.

  Talk about being able to get the peasant out of the country, but not the country out of the peasant. At heart, like most, René believed that only land was secure, the only guarantee against famine in wartime. A misconception proved during every famine and war.

  “The star pupil in my hacking class referred me to this real estate broker,” he said, sitting down on his orthopedic chair and booting up his computer. “The property’s in probate; the estate will make a deal. Aimée, we can’t go wrong, the quartier’s up and coming.”

  “A hip investment in old proletarian Paris, René?” she said. “I was there, in that very neighborhood, last night.”

  She handed him a demitasse of espresso. René raised his eyebrow.

  “Partying?”

  She kept Yves’s visit to herself; no use telling René, or he’d say she’d fallen for Yves’s line yet again.

  “Working. I netted the Microimage contract last night.”

  René inhaled and whistled. “Not bad. Should take care of those, eh?” He pointed to the bills on her desk. Then an expression she couldn’t read crossed René’s face. “Why didn’t you answer your phone?”

  She thumbed on her cell phone. Nothing.

  “Try charging the battery.”

  A voice said, “Mademoiselle Aimée Leduc? I’m from the Commissariat.”

  Aimée looked up see a blue-uniformed flic standing at the open office
door. Short cropped brown hair, muscles under his shirt, and no expression on his face. Goosebumps ran up her arms despite the heat.

  “Permettez?” he said, entering the room. “I agree with the gentleman.” His thick black shoes creaked over the wood floor.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You might want to keep your phone charged,” he said. “Will you accompany me, please?”

  “Since when is it against the law—” she caught herself. “What’s this about?”

  “Routine. We need to ask you some questions.”

  “But I don’t understand.”

  “My vehicle’s outside,” he said.

  René set down his cup hard. Little brown drops spattered over the real estate comparisons. “Does this have to do with her cell phone, officer?”

  He shrugged. “Her number was the last one dialed from a victim’s phone.”

  “A victim?” René asked. “Are you saying she’s a suspect?”

  “Pure routine, as I’ve said. We’d appreciate your cooperation. Now.”

  “But that was me. . . .” René eased off his orthopedic chair and stood.

  “I’m afraid not, Monsieur,” he said. His gaze held for a moment, taking in René’s stature. Like many did.

  Aimée said, alarmed, “I’m not going anywhere until you explain.”

  “Take it up with the Commandant, Mademoiselle; he’s waiting. That’s all I can say.”

  René looked at her and then handed her his cell phone. “Mine’s charged. Call me afterward.”

  The flic gestured toward the door.

  “After you.”

  * * *

  EACH TIME THE Commissariat’s double doors swung open, Aimée heard the blare of car horns layered over the sound of the rushing water of Canal Saint-Martin.

  The bad feeling she’d had in the police car heightened. The flic had responded to her questions in monosyllables, refused to reveal any more information, and escorted her inside the station. He’d disappeared once she’d seated herself on a contoured plastic chair. She tried to think who had been the last person to call her. And then it hit her . . . Jean-Paul, her disastrous blind date.

  “He’ll see you now,” said the receptionist. “Room 12.”

  Aimée strode inside an office. Metal file cabinets lined the walls, anonymous, standard issue, like those in any other commissariat except for the map of the tenth arrondissement taking up half the wall. Another map sectioned the arrondisse-ment into quartiers: Saint Vincent de Paul, the working-class section with hospitals and Gare du Nord and Gare de l’Est; Porte Saint-Denis, Michel’s district of renovated warehouses, 18th-century hôtels particuliers and covered passages; Porte Saint-Martin, old convents and theatres; and l’Hôpital Saint-Louis, bordering the Canal: an arrondissement notable for hospitals, train stations, and old prisons.

  A middle-aged man with sparse brown hair, a broad forehead, and rolled-up shirtsleeves swiveled around in his chair. Behind him, floor to ceiling windows overlooked the dirt-encrusted metal-and-glass canopy roof of a workshop. His smooth-shaven face, the lines more pronounced around the close-set eyes, was familiar.

  “Maillol?”

  “It’s Commander Maillol now,” he said, thumbing open a file on the otherwise clear desk. She remembered him; one of the recruits her father had worked with before Maillol had been assigned to the statistics bureau. A numbers man. And a backstabber, rumor went. Soon after working with Maillol, her father had left the force and joined her grandfather at Leduc Detective.

  No doubt he still won at belote, she thought, recalling the smoke drifting from the off-duty flics around the card table in their kitchen. She remembered the late nights, empty bottles of pastis, and Maillol counting his winnings with a smug look. Maillol, her father had said, was a frustrated academic who’d failed his baccalaureate exams several times.

  “Is this about Jean-Paul Orcut?” she asked, concerned.

  “Mademoiselle Leduc,” he said, “what’s your relationship to Yves Robert?” He consulted a file, answering her question with his own.

  She was taken by surprise. She sat without being asked. “Problematic at best. But perhaps you should explain why I’m here and what this has to do with—”

  “Your number showed on his cell phone,” he said consulting the file.

  “Why shouldn’t it? Is that illegal?”

  “If you’d kept yours on, this formality could have been averted. We could have just called you.”

  This didn’t make sense. Neither did his businesslike tone or his distancing himself from their shared past.

  “I work with absolutes.” He pointed to a chart on the door. Cases solved, cases pending, all arranged in neat columns in black marker.

  “I don’t understand,” she said. She leaned forward. “I’m more than acquainted with procedure. . . .”

  “We found the victim’s cell phone in the suspect’s possession.” He looked up. “Your number was the last one dialed.”

  Her hands gripped the armchair. “A victim? The Brigade Criminelle handles homicides.”

  “You’re right, it’s in the Brigade Criminelle’s hands. They would appreciate your assistance. Formal identification is needed at the morgue.”

  Her world spun and crashed. Nausea rose in the pit of her stomach.

  “Non . . . you’ve got the wrong . . . person.” Her voice rose. “There’s some mistake.”

  “A sanitation worker discovered a corpse at 7 A.M. on rue de Paradis,” he said, his tone removed and businesslike. “So far, a wallet and a cell phone have been found in the suspect’s possession.”

  A body; a suspect. Her mind whirled. This was moving too fast.

  “It appears to have been robbery and murder during a sexual assignation gone wrong.”

  “Sexual assignation?”

  “The suspect, a male prostitute, has as good as admitted it.”

  “But that’s impossible!”

  Of course, they’d gotten the wrong person. A mistake. She could breathe again.

  “In what way?” Maillol’s close set eyes narrowed into slits.

  “Yves was with me last night.”

  Maillol pushed the file to the side and leaned back, tenting his fingers. “Why don’t you tell me about it, Mademoiselle Leduc?”

  THE WHITE-COATED morgue attendant pointed to the logbook. “Sign in and date it, please, Mademoiselle Leduc.”

  The attendant looked no more than twenty-five. Blue ink stained his palms. He was probably a pre-med student, Aimée thought. Her hands shook as she clutched the pen. Then it fell from her fingers and clattered on the white-tiled floor.

  “Use mine.” He pulled one from his lapel. “Sign right here, next to Number 48.”

  Her stomach churned. She’d visited the bowels of the morgue to identify the charred remains of her father after the Place Vendôme explosion, had later been to the viewing cubicle in the basement to try to identify a drowned woman, but she had never been to what was known as “the freezer.” Her signature came out a blotted scribble.

  The attendant took her arm. “Bon, we’ll just pull him out and then you can—”

  “I know there’s a mistake. That’s why I’m here,” she interrupted. There had to have been some error. A horrible one. “I’m cooperating so the real victim’s loved ones can be found.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Can you handle this, Mademoiselle?”

  The last thing in the world she wanted to do was walk into the freezer.

  “Of course,” she said, taking a deep breath. In the few minutes she’d stood here, the combined odors of formaldehyde and pine disinfectant had overwhelmed her. She wanted to get this over, get out of here, and get the smell off her clothes. Then she’d find Yves and give him a piece of her mind. A big piece of her mind. What business did he have just appearing, asking her to spend her life with him, leaving without a goodbye. . . .

  “Mademoiselle?”

  She followed him through the swinging doors, through the stri
ps of clear plastic that enclosed the frigid air. Their footsteps echoed off the glazed white tile. Built-in stainless steel drawers lined the chilly room, numbers handlettered on index cards inserted in slots above the drawer handles.

  She closed her eyes. Heard the creaking of the wheels as rollers slid out, the stiff crackling as the plastic sheet was folded back, and smelled the cloying sickly-sweet smell of death.

  “Ready, Mademoiselle?”

  Please God, she prayed, don’t let it be him. Like she had prayed for her father. Made all those little promises that she’d be good, do the right thing—whatever that was—if it just wasn’t him. Get a grip, she told herself. She’d met Yves when he was undercover. He was an investigative journalist, he knew how to handle himself. Of course, he’d been following a tip, meeting a contact . . . this whole thing was a terrible mistake, some bizarre fluke.

  A buzzer sounded, startling her, and she jumped.

  “Mademoiselle, we’re busy. I need to answer the door.”

  Her eyes opened and her gaze fell on Yves’s face, the charcoal stubble on his chin, the milky white crescents just visible in his three-quarter-closed eyes. A sheet covered his mouth and chin.

  She stumbled against the cold drawer and grabbed the handle to steady herself. And yet he looked almost as if he were sleeping. She peered closer.

  “Yves?” she called.

  He was sleeping the vacant sleep of the dead.

  “He can’t answer, Mademoiselle.”

  “But . . .” she reached out, and the attendant caught her hand.

  “I can assure you—”

  “Let me see him,” she interrupted. “All of him.”

  “The identification procedure doesn’t permit me to do this.”

  “You mean you don’t want me to see—”

  “I want to spare you the. . . .” He paused, hesitation laced with irritation in his voice, “details unnecessary for an identification.”

  Before he could stop her, she pulled down the blue plastic sheet with shaking hands. She gasped at the sight of the uneven black thread stitches closing the wide incision running down his chest. Autopsied . . . already? His head slumped, but not enough to hide the red slits in the skin of his neck, nor the red swirl under his ear.